Companies paid nearly $60 million to over 46,000 physicians for AI-enabled devices between 2017 to 2023, a recent Philadelphia-based University of Pennsylvania study found.
Published in Health Affairs Scholar, the study found that cardiologists receive the most payments for AI medical devices, followed by brain surgeons and radiologists.
The study used the Open Payments database to examine payments made by industry to clinicians for FDA-approved AI medical devices. They then linked payments to the affiliated hospital of the clinician using the Medicare Provider Data catalog.
Paid physicians were more likely to be associated with well-resourced academic hospitals, which suggests that under-resourced hospitals in rural and urban areas are less likely to have access to this technology.
“We’re laying the groundwork for how AI will function in medicine,” lead author Alon Bergman, PhD, said in a March 11 university news release. “How it’s built will determine whether AI closes gaps in care or widens them.”
The authors said more funds and infrastructure are needed to help smaller rural and urban hospitals adopt AI medical devices, or they may become more reliant on vendors when making purchasing decisions.
AI devices are booming right now. Since mid-2025, over 1,200 AI-enabled devices have received FDA approval, a 350% rise in clearances over five years, the release said. However, most of these devices are cleared through the FDA’s 510(k) pathway, which only requires manufacturers to show substantial equivalence to a previous product. Many AI tools bypass FDA review entirely — most commonly AI scribes, since they are not considered medical devices.
